Shift for Brains

Bill talks with Bob and Norma Silverstein, Cape Breton patient advocates with parents who experienced tragic circumstances in care. Norma’s parents, now passed, were married for 70 years and could not be placed in same nursing home, and her father died of sepsis related to unattended bedsores.

Together with Dr Jeanne Ferguson, Geriatric Specialist in Cape Breton, Bob & Norma have founded Families for Quality Elder Care, an advocacy group for families and elderly patients in care. Our health care system in Nova Scotia is not prepared for both the volume and the complexity of the health needs of our elder citizens.

Part two of our discussion of ethical meat deals with the shift that happens when you change from a meat based diet to a plant based diet. In this episode Bill sits down with David Baxter who, along with his family, is making a transition from raising his own animals for meat to a more plant based diet that still includes dairy, eggs and honey. Later in the episode, Bill talks with Derrick Sweet who follows a strict plant based diet and discusses why he made the shift and the benefits he sees from a meatless diet.

A Simple Matter of Justice. On March 21st, Abdoul Abdi will learn whether he will be deported back to Somalia, a country he has never been to. Born in Saudi Arabia to a Somalian mother, Abdi arrived in Canada at the age of 6, lived in 31 different foster homes throughout his childhood and was never given the chance to apply for citizenship. In our latest episode, Bill sat down with El Jones to discuss Abdi’s case, how the system failed him and what’s next.

Bill sits down with Rae Lutz, and her daughter Megan Rand, from Pasture Hill Farms, and Lil MacPherson, food activist and owner of the Wooden Monkey restaurants to talk about ethical meat. They tackle everything from animal rights, to the environmental impact of industrial farming, to why there is a growing demand for local & ethically raised meat.

Marijuana. The Canadian government is set to legalize it in 2018. Bill sat down with Chris Enns from Farm Assists, and Carl Morgan of Scotia Green Inc. to discuss legalization, recreational use, government control over distribution, and their first hand experiences as entrepreneurs on the front line in the marijuana industry.

Food Insecurity, our first episode, is all about a silent epidemic that permeates our communities and diminishes all of us with its insidious debilitating effects on far too many of our most vulnerable.

We are talking with Jackie Torrens – a film maker and courageous advocate for those who suffer from Food Insecurity, and Tim Blades, a member of BRAG: Benefits Reform Action Group, a team of first voice welfare recipients and professionals from our community who speak up on issues and fight for change with Nova Scotia’s Employment Support and Income Assistance program. We talk about the very personal effects of stereo-types about people affected by poverty and some of the realities about Food Insecurity in our communities.